


forget your perfect offering

by Maculategiraffe



Series: How Life Goes On, The Way It Does [16]
Category: Fallout 4
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:47:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21993949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maculategiraffe/pseuds/Maculategiraffe
Summary: Leonard Cohen, "Anthem"
Relationships: Paladin Danse (Fallout)/Original Male Character(s)
Series: How Life Goes On, The Way It Does [16]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/456004
Comments: 12
Kudos: 42
Collections: Fandom Trumps Hate 2019





	forget your perfect offering

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the_little_flower](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_little_flower/gifts).



> [Leonard Cohen, "Anthem"](https://youtu.be/mDTph7mer3I)

Danse swims back into awareness, to the sound of voices. Dear voices, but with a disconcerting tension to them.

"--be fine, son. We're not leaving him here alone. Unconscious. Don't be ridiculous."

Danse isn't actually unconscious, if it's him they mean, but he is quite disoriented. Everything is dark, reddish dark, and his body feels heavier and softer than usual, and his right leg hurts. Hurts, but in a muted, distant way that suggests something-- shock? Medication?-- is protecting him from the full reality of how badly it should be hurting.

How badly it was hurting, before--

Nora's voice is saying, "Listen, the quicker I go, the quicker I'll be back."

Michael's, arguing. "But I can move more quickly--"

"You can defend Danse better, too, if anything else like that pops up."

"But if you're attacked--"

"Stay right here, Michael," Nora says. Orders. "Until I get back. I'm trusting you to look after Danse for me. Understood?"

"Yes, ma'am," Michael answers.

Nora says, "I'll be right back." 

And then there are footfalls, and then silence.

Danse has figured out why it's dark. He opens his eyes.

Sunlight and mist curling through one another, treetops and rocks and crags against the sky. He's horizontal. Something soft under his head, and under his legs.

That's right. Far Harbor. 

To be precise, somewhere between the Nucleus, where they left X6-- he wanted to talk further with Oswald and Cleansed, and with Richter, whom he seemed to like-- and the Minutemen-allied settlement at Echo Lake Lumber, where Nora wanted to visit. Emily and Nick and Ellie were still at Acadia, being looked after by Chase, so it was just the three of them, Nora and Michael and Danse, heading west.

Now Michael's sitting beside Danse, not looking at him, and then he does look down, and his face transforms, shatters into an expression Danse can't put a name to, for a split second before Michael pulls it back together into what Danse thinks of as his courser expression. Studied, controlled, motionless.

"Don't try to move," he orders Danse. "Can I do anything to make you more comfortable?"

"I think I'm--" Apart from the vague pain in his leg, and the sharp dryness in his throat, he's more comfortable than he would have expected, lying on the forest floor. "Is there any water?"

Michael nods, reaches for the canteen at his belt. Fills the cap carefully with water.

"Sip slowly," he instructs, and holds the cap, carefully, to Danse's lips. Danse sips _very_ slowly, reveling in the pure water on his tongue and down his parched throat, water from Michael's hand.

When the cap is empty, Michael refills it, places it at Danse's lips again, and then a third time, and then Danse says, "Thank you," and, as Michael replaces the cap on the canteen, "What happened? Where's Nora?" 

He sees the muscles in Michael's throat clench, and then loosen. It's alarming, but also beautiful, as every movement Michael makes, voluntary or involuntary, is beautiful to Danse.

"We didn't bring enough medical supplies," says Michael. "She forgot-- she says-- how much-- wilder-- Far Harbor still is, than the Commonwealth. And I didn't-- I simply assumed she had-- overpacked, as she always-- I should have verified--"

And-- Danse remembers, now-- something hit him, from above. Something huge, heavy, clammy, _alive._ It knocked him down, knocked the breath out of him, sank claws into him, and its teeth sank into his leg, shook and _tore--_

Danse looks down at his own legs. One of the legs of his jeans has been sawn off above the knee, and the leg beneath it is bandaged, the pale shadow of a bloodstain visible under the topmost layer of the bandage. 

"I should have worn my power armor," he says, teasing-- Michael is the one who persuaded him to leave it behind-- but instead of smiling, Michael's face goes even blanker, stiller, and his voice, when he answers, is expressionless, too.

"We had to use everything we had," he says, "and it wasn't enough. We knew, even if we waited for you to awaken, you wouldn't be able to walk. She used her Med-X, to ease the pain, and--" He swallows again. "She went-- alone. For help. Back to the Nucleus."

It must be the Med-X; it takes Danse entirely too long to locate, and then lift, his own hand.

"I told you not to--" Michael begins, sharply, then breaks off as Danse's slightly numb hand locates Michael's, and grips.

Michael grips back, and although the numbing medication keeps Danse from feeling it quite the way he normally would, he's fairly sure Michael is gripping _hard._

Danse would like to say something comforting: that Nora will be fine, that Michael shouldn't worry, but. Michael knows what a good fighter Nora is, her track record; if he's still worried anyway, Danse isn't likely to change his mind. 

He ventures, hoping it will be a reassuring notion, "Do you think she'll bring X6 back with her?" 

"Yes," says Michael. "I would imagine X6 will prefer to accompany her for the rest of this trip." 

His voice is still as expressionless as his face. 

"This isn't your fault," Danse protests. 

Michael looks at him as if he's talking complete nonsense, which is still better than the blank courser look. 

"It's just as much mine," says Danse. "Or hers. None of us saw that thing coming." 

They didn't. He remembers now: they were laughing. Some silly joke Nora made. He can't remember what it was. 

Michael says, "You don't have courser training." 

"I was a paladin with the Brotherhood of Steel," Danse points out. "We had training, too." 

Michael makes a quick, impatient gesture with his head, as if to flick away a bothersome insect, and doesn't answer. 

Danse says, feeling his way, feeling maybe a little braver and more talkative because of the Med-X, which he's never been on before, and which is a little like being tipsy, but more calming, "And she didn't take either of us in because of our training. Or to protect her. That isn't why she values us. Either one of us." 

"I know that," says Michael. "But what will that matter, if she dies?" 

It comes out flat, harsh, and Danse winces a little. He stops himself from saying _She won't--_ an empty promise, she's a human, she may not die today but she will eventually, and probably before Michael does-- and says instead, "It will still matter. That she loved us. And why." 

Michael looks at him, intently. Considering him. His face. 

Danse hasn't covered his scar today, the way he sometimes does away from home, with the folded bandana Nora says makes him look rakish, or with a wide-brimmed hat drawn low over his brow. It didn't seem necessary at Acadia, where everyone is a synth, and knows what suffering that can bring. Or at the Nucleus, where facial scarification is in vogue, anyway, patterns of circles and dots carefully inked on nearly everyone's foreheads or cheeks or both. 

And of course, out here with Nora and Michael, it isn't necessary. Each of them has kissed his scar, leaned down close enough for him to feel their heat and their breath, pressed lips where no one ever kissed him before, even when the skin there was whole. When he feels his forehead now, it thrums with the warmth of those soft kisses, the first shy, clumsy benisons of the love that's still mending him. 

"I know you want to take care of her," says Danse. "And me." 

Michael looks away from him, nods, once. 

"And you do," says Danse, still tentative, but increasingly sure, as he says it, that it's what Michael needs to hear. "You have, and you will. But no one is-- infallible. No-- no person." 

Michael's eyes come back to his face, steady and unreadable. 

Danse fumbles on, "We might be-- we might have the _capacity_ to be-- better than humans--" 

(And isn't _that_ a strange thing for Saul Danse, erstwhile paladin, to say and mean. But he's spent too much time now around synths, around his brothers and sisters, around Michael-- and too much time, before that, in the unrelieved company of humans-- not to have come to believe it.) 

"--but we can't be perfect," he says, because that's true too. Even Michael, even he isn't _perfect._ "They, the Institute, they didn't design us that way. They gave us-- human things-- distractibility, and desire--" 

He can feel himself go a little hot, feel his skin flushing, just at the word _desire_. To Michael. Michael's taught him so much, rewarded him so often for being bold, for saying, showing, what he _wants._

Michael smiles at him, very briefly, a glimpse of sunlight through a momentary gap in the clouds, before they close over again. But it's something. 

Michael says, "Yes. And the capacity to love. But what good is that, if I can't-- protect--" 

Danse squeezes his hand harder. 

"That isn't what love is good for," he says, and although he knows so much less about love than Michael, although Michael has taught him almost everything he does know, he knows he's right about this. 

"For keeping people _safe?"_ Michael sounds incredulous. 

Danse shakes his head, rocks it back and forth on whatever soft thing it's resting on. Something from Nora's pack, probably. Spare clothing, carefully bundled into a pillow. Danse can picture her and Michael working over his own unconscious body, swiftly and efficiently and carefully, settling him-- once he was stable-- as comfortably as they could. It's an oddly pleasant thought: himself, unknowingly, helplessly, entrusted to their loving hands. 

"If it were," he says, "there wouldn't be any such thing as grief. Because no one who was loved would ever be lost." 

Michael says, "Humans have to die, eventually. But they don't have to die of-- carelessness." 

"Carelessness is human," says Danse. "Divided attention. Only machines have perfect focus. And we aren't-- perfectly-- machines." 

He's daring to keep on talking back, because of the Med-X, and because the alternative is to lie here in silence while Michael tortures himself with images of his mother dying or being badly hurt, far away from help, and it being his fault, because he wasn't good enough. 

At least Danse can try to-- do what love _is_ good for, sometimes. Keep Michael company. So he isn't-- so neither of them is-- alone. 

Michael repeats, as if it's a phrase he's never heard before, as if he's quoting Danse's coinage, "Divided attention." 

"Yes," says Danse. "I did that to you, didn't I? Divided your focus. When you began to--" He can't say _want me_ , it's too brazen, his ears will catch fire. "Be interested. In me." 

Michael smiles at him again, not the sudden involuntary flash, but a slow, wry smile that makes Danse squirm, until a bolt of pain from his leg stills him. 

"I told you not to move," says Michael, but not angrily. 

"Did it--" Danse is remembering the way the creature tore at his flesh, tore his leg half _away._ "Will I recover completely, do you think?" 

It's not-- well, it's not a _pleasant_ idea, that he might be permanently crippled, lose some measure of usefulness, but the prospect isn't the fathomless abyss it would once have been, either. He'll be cared for, either way. 

"You will," says Michael, still smiling, a little. "It's nothing the stimpaks can't cure. Muscle and tissue can be regrown. Ours, especially." 

Danse says, irrelevantly, except that he's still thinking about _divided attention_ , "Remember when we first went to Goodneighbor? We were attacked on the way, by raiders. You protected me, and Nora--" 

"She was hurt," says Michael. "I remember." 

"But she praised you, for protecting me," says Danse. 

Michael nods. 

"I was still afraid, that I was doing something wrong," he says. "I left you-- do you remember?-- and went to her. To her room, in the Goodneighbor hotel." 

"I remember," says Danse. He does; remembers waiting, not tired and not afraid, for Michael to come back to him. 

"I went to her because--" Michael's jaw tenses, untenses. "I felt-- in need of guidance." 

"Because you'd protected me instead of her?" Danse asks. 

Michael nods. "And because I-- wanted you." 

His smile flashes out again, bright and quick and fleeting, and Danse smiles back. 

"I don't mean only-- carnally," Michael says, and the unexpected word widens Danse's smile, flushes his skin hotter. "Though the Institute certainly didn't encourage that kind of-- but I mean, I wanted _you._ I was-- preoccupied, with you. Fascinated. I wanted you to be--" He looks Danse right in the eye, his own fathomless dark eyes unflinching. "Mine." 

"I am," says Danse, heart pounding, less because of the avowal-- which is just the simple truth-- than because of the way Michael is looking at him, that intent, proprietary stare, that feels like strong, molding hands on his body, in the dark. 

"I didn't expect-- harshness," says Michael. "From her. Even when she's had to correct me, she's always been-- gentle. But she wasn't even-- it was as if she had _expected_ it." His eyes are soft and bright. "As if it were, were _natural_. For me to-- fall in love." 

"After all, you weren't the first one of her children, to do so," Danse ventures. "Emily was already-- involved-- with Kasumi." 

"Yes," says Michael. "Well. I suppose it had been difficult for me, even after my disgrace, to consider myself as-- quite the same kind of thing, as Emily. As a synth with no particular specialized training, no surface functionality, no-- discipline. I thought-- I suppose-- that I was still in a different category." 

"And now you know you're not," says Danse. "You're just like the rest of us. Hardly even any better than a human." 

Michael laughs, hard, delighting Danse, and catches his breath, and says, "Aren't you pert. I'm glad you aren't in too much pain." 

"I'm not looking forward to the Med-X wearing off," says Danse. 

"I have some more," says Michael. "One more dose. Before you need more than that, she should be--" 

He hesitates. 

"Back," says Danse. "Yes. Before that, and before dark." He looks up at the afternoon sunlight, slanting through the trees. "It's a lovely day." 

"You are quite ridiculously human yourself, sometimes," says Michael, and reaches the hand that isn't clutched in Danse's, to smooth his forehead. His hand is warm, lingers on Danse's bare, scarred skin. 

He says, "You could have died." 

"Yes," says Danse. "But I didn't." 

Michael's face does the thing it did when he saw Danse's eyes were open, a twisting, wrenching, hard and brutal and gone in an instant, and then he turns it away from Danse, not only averting his gaze but his whole face. Danse can still see half of it, though, Michael's profile, the strong, arched nose, high cheekbone, taut mouth, dark brow. One eye, half lidded, downcast. He's still holding onto Danse's hand, with one hand. 

He says to his other hand, which is curled now into a fist on his thigh, "When she comes back, do you want to press on to Echo Lake Lumber, or go back to the Nucleus to recover?" 

"Oh, press on," says Danse. "Always." 

Michael nods, and they lapse into silence. Birds sing in the trees, water laps against an unseen shore. 

Then a crashing-- Michael tenses, ready to spring-- 

\--and Nora, hatless, flushed, and damp with perspiration, comes charging back into the clearing, X6 just behind her, wearing the black leather jacket and black jeans that have replaced his courser uniform, since Nuka World. 

"There," Nora says, breathless, plunging to her knees by Danse's feet; X6 stays standing, still and watchful behind her. "Wasn't I fast? Just put my kids on the line, that's all. Or don't, preferably. Don't look, Danse." 

He's almost certainly seen worse, but he obeys her, lifts his eyes to Michael's face as Nora begins to unwind the bandage from his leg. 

"Michael," he says, and Michael's eyes meet his. "It's all right now." 

Michael nods, but he doesn't look altogether relieved. 

Danse can feel Nora's hands on his leg, feel muted pain, and a distant pinprick, and then a tingling. It makes him think of the bunker, how she told them to give Danse the stimpaks, to heal her injuries. _Anybody else touches me again, all bets are off._

He says, grinning despite the discomfort, "'Jam 'em in just anywhere.'" 

"Oh my God," says Nora, laughter in her voice. "I was thinking the exact same thing. I'm sorry, I don't have as steady a hand as you, but-- OK. That should do it." She sits back on her heels, wipes her brow with her sleeve. "Now we wait." 

"Thank you," says Danse. 

"Sure, sweetheart," says Nora. "And listen, we can rest here as long as you need. Make camp and spend the night, if you want." 

"Thank you," says Danse again, "but that's not necessary. I'd like to get to Echo Lake Lumber before dark. A safe night's rest will do us all good, after this-- scare." 

"Amen," says Nora. "OK. Then you let us know when you're good to get up. Thirsty?" 

"Yes, please," says Danse, and she smiles, and gives him water.  
. 

They're welcomed readily at Echo Lake Lumber, by settlers who recognize Michael and Nora from their first trip here. (They keep mentioning something called the Captain's Dance, which seems to have impressed them considerably, and confuses Danse a bit, since he keeps thinking they're saying his name.) There's food, and the offer of spare beds, which Danse at least will welcome; his leg's functional, no longer actually painful, but if past experience holds true, he won't feel quite himself again until he's slept. He doesn't know how that works with synths like Michael and X6, who don't sleep at all. They must experience the transition to _healed_ consciously, the way-- if he's understood Michael and Emily correctly-- they have something like waking dreams. 

After they eat, the four of them sit quietly around the last embers of an outdoor woodfire, in the gathering dusk. The settlers here have retired, or gathered elsewhere, tactfully left their visitors alone, as if they sense there's a conversation the four of them need to have. 

"I'm sorry, guys," says Nora, breaking the silence. "That was really stupid of me. Not bringing enough supplies. And letting my guard down. I guess I've gotten lazy, from how much easier the Commonwealth is these days." 

(Danse appreciates the apology, likes that Nora, who was so arrogant and touchy in their first, ill-fated encounter, is so ready now to offer one up. In some contexts, anyway. _Just put my kids on the line, that's all_.) 

X6 takes breath to speak, and Danse tenses a little. X6 loves Michael, but he might not know how gentle he needs to be right now, how much Michael has already castigated himself for his role in the accident. 

X6 says, "In the future, it might be wise for us to inventory one another's packs, as well as our own, before setting out." 

Nora nods. "Sounds like a plan." 

"But the two of you kept your heads, when Danse was attacked," says X6. "Took care of the threat quickly, used what you did have wisely, and successfully averted disaster." 

"Thanks, son," says Nora. "Yeah, it could have been a lot worse." 

Michael says nothing. 

The four of them sit in silence for a bit. Danse would be feeling ridiculously happy-- the after-effects of near disaster, the euphoria of regained safety, good company and the relief of X6's kindness-- if only he knew what Michael was thinking. 

It's Nora who says, finally, "Michael?" 

Michael lifts his head, but doesn't speak. 

"Son," says Nora. "Are you OK?" 

Michael shakes his head. 

"Is it because you think it's your fault, what happened?" Nora asks, and Michael shakes his head again. "No? Is it that it scared you?" 

Michael nods. 

"Me and Danse, both in danger," she says. "It's a lot." 

He nods again. It's getting too dark out to see his expression well. The firelight illuminates it fitfully, enough for them to see when it gleams suddenly, in the ruddy light. Tears, bright as stars. 

Danse is up out of his chair, then, and so is Nora, and then X6, the three of them gathering around Michael, Nora behind him, her hands on his shoulders, X6 at his side, Danse before him, kneeling at his feet. 

Michael draws in a shuddering breath, and Danse remembers-- vividly, and with a sorrow that no longer threatens to drown him, not because it's less deep and wide than always, but because he's no longer alone and adrift-- Haylen. How she leaned her weight on him, the night their comrade died despite her desperate, tireless nursing, and wept. 

He didn't understand then, not really, how she felt. But he's thought about it many times, since, and maybe he does know, now, or can guess: exhausted, helpless, in the face of the world's mindless, brutal seizing, of everything that matters. 

And even when things aren't seized-- like today-- it isn't easy to feel how easily they could have been. What a thin, ultimately undefendable barrier lies between a happy life, and a life that-- 

He says, "It's not-- it isn't--" 

The other three all look at him, waiting, and he falters, almost says _nothing, never mind,_ almost decides to let Nora and X6, both so much more confident than he, be the ones to try to say something helpful. But-- 

"It isn't-- exactly-- comforting," he says, finally, slowly. Digging deep, into the parts of him that have an answer, to the tears on Michael's face. It's hard, but it's something he can do, for love. "To think how much more suffering we're capable of bearing, than we think. Than we would choose, even. If I could have chosen a-- a breaking point-- an amount of pain to, to bring an end, to me--" 

Nora makes a little sound, a murmur, maybe of agreement. 

"But I'm glad now that I didn't," says Danse. "End." 

"Oh, yes," says Nora softly. 

_Yes_ she's glad Danse didn't die, despite his suffering, despite the loss of everything he'd ever thought made suffering and survival worthwhile? Or that _she_ didn't die, despite her own pain and loss? 

Both, he guesses, and that she's glad for Michael and X6, too, and Hancock, and Emily, and everyone she loves, who's made it so far. 

Michael reaches for him, and Danse offers up his hands. Thankful as he was for the Med-X at the time, he's very glad it's worn off, that he can feel Michael's hands in his perfectly now, the calluses and imperfections of the skin, the warmth and strength of his grip. 

Looking up, Danse sees Nora move her hands from Michael's shoulders to his temples, take his head in her hands from behind, and tilt it back towards her. It shocks Danse a little-- not in the sense that it seems _wrong_ , there's nothing rough or indecorous about the touch, but he isn't used to seeing Michael-- proud, dignified, dangerous Michael-- _handled_ , like that. 

Michael doesn't startle or tense up, though; he just looks up at Nora, and Nora leans down and kisses him on the forehead. 

"Son," she says, the way she does, making the single syllable sound like an endearment and an encomium and a vow, all in one, "Danse is tired out. Take him to the guesthouse and get him settled for the night. I'll see you in the morning." 

"Yes, ma'am," says Michael, the way he did in the forest, before Danse opened his eyes. 

. 

And when they're pressed close together in the narrow, borrowed bed, Danse says, again, as he did in the forest, "Michael, it's all right now." 

He doesn't only mean that he's all right, that his leg is all right, that he and Michael and Nora all lived through the afternoon's miscalculations. 

He means that it's all right that Michael can't speak, that his lips taste like salt. That there's enough, now. Enough love, enough care, enough strength, to carry all their tired hearts through. 


End file.
